Sano opened it and unfurled the scroll. He read calligraphy as crooked as the man who’d written it: “Please meet me at the forest preserve, to discuss a matter of urgent importance to both of us. Ienobu.”
The forest preserve was a carefully maintained wilderness inside Edo Castle. In the early days after the earthquake, Sano had once gone to the preserve to escape the devastation and have a solitary rest from his constant toil. He’d found it overrun by other men there for the same purpose and servants sawing up fallen trees for firewood. Now the preserve was quiet, the foliage golden green where the late afternoon sun shone on it and black under the clouds. The only blight was Ienobu and two bodyguards, seated on a blanket spread on the grass, amid empty lacquer lunch boxes, below a canopy.
“I had a bet with myself that you would get here by the time we finished our picnic,” Ienobu said as Sano approached. The guards went to stand by the gate in the wall that surrounded the preserve, within clear sight of Ienobu and Sano but out of earshot. Ienobu extended his gnarled hand to Sano. “Please, join me.”
Sano knelt under the canopy. He and Ienobu exchanged bows.
“Did you have a good talk with my uncle?” Ienobu asked.
At first Sano was surprised that Ienobu knew he’d seen the shogun; then enlightenment struck. “It was you who told him I’m investigating Tsuruhime’s death.”
Ienobu grinned; his lips pulled farther back from his teeth. “Very astute of you.”
“You suggested that the shogun should ask me why I’m investigating,” Sano deduced. “You sent a page to waylay me outside the palace after I left.”
Ienobu nodded.
“How did you manage to get to your uncle? You were banned from court.”
“Oh, I still have friends inside the castle. They sneaked me into the palace. My uncle was a bit reluctant to see me, but when I told him that you’re investigating his daughter’s death, he listened.”
“How do you know I am?” Sano asked.
“I have friends in Lord Tsunanori’s estate. They said you’d been asking questions.”
“Who are they?”
Ienobu touched his finger to his lips. “A wise man repays favors with discretion.”
Sano had an image of an octopus with Ienobu’s face, sitting in a dark, underwater cave, its long tentacles rippling outward, their suction cups attaching to anything or anyone it thought useful. “Why did you tell the shogun?”
“I think he deserves to know what’s going on behind his back,” Ienobu said with a sanctimonious air.
“Forgive me if I don’t believe you’re that altruistic. Are you using me to attack Yanagisawa and Yoshisato? It would please you to have the shogun suspect them of killing his daughter.”
Ienobu laughed, a wheezy sound like stiff leather bellows pumping. “I can’t put anything over on you, can I, Sano-san?”
“Not when it’s obvious that you’d like Yoshisato to fall out of favor with the shogun so you can inherit the dictatorship. How did you know Yoshisato and Yanagisawa are suspects?”
“I figured you wouldn’t have convinced yourself that Tsuruhime was murdered and run a secret inquiry, except to get at them.”
Sano wondered whether Ienobu knew about Lady Nobuko, Korika, and the infected sheet. He didn’t ask lest he give away information that Ienobu would put to bad use. “I didn’t tell the shogun that they’re suspects.”
Ienobu frowned in disappointment but said, “It’s just as well. No use throwing around accusations until you can make them stick.”
Disconcerted, Sano said, “How do you know I haven’t found any proof that Yanagisawa or Yoshisato is guilty? Do you have ‘friends’ in my house, too?”
Ienobu repeated his wheezy laugh. “Don’t worry. I simply figured that if you had, they would have been charged with murder already.”
Sano wasn’t reassured; Ienobu hadn’t denied spying on him. “Why did you want to see me? Just to find out what the shogun said?”
“Let’s start with that.”
“He ordered me to take time off from my other duties and catch the killer. What’s the ‘important matter’ that you mentioned in your message?”
Ienobu brought his fingertips together, as if collecting his thoughts between them. Sano was struck by the difference between Ienobu and Yanagisawa. Since that day when Ienobu had been thrown out of the court, Yanagisawa had grown reckless, taken over by his emotions; Ienobu had cooled down. Once Sano had thought Ienobu didn’t stand a chance against Yanagisawa. Now he wasn’t so sure.
“Suppose you manage to incriminate Yanagisawa and Yoshisato,” Ienobu said. “Maybe that will take them out of the picture; maybe not. Yanagisawa is good at getting around the shogun. He’s also good at covering his tracks. It’s probable that you’ll fail to pin the murder on Yanagisawa, and he and Yoshisato will go on their merry way toward ruling Japan. In that case, what would you do?”
Downcast by the bleak scenario Ienobu described, Sano was silent. He thought it better not to disclose his intention—destroying Yanagisawa—to a man he distrusted more and more as time went on.
Ienobu smiled with satisfaction, as if he’d divined Sano’s thoughts and Sano had played into his hands. “Here’s what I wanted to discuss: I’m going to make you a proposition.”
I’m attracting propositions like spilled honey attracts flies, Sano thought. “What is it?”
“Join forces with me.” The mocking humor fell away from Ienobu. His voice turned rough, urgent. “I help you destroy Yanagisawa and his bastard. Then you support my bid for the succession.”
Sano was still conflicted about destroying Yoshisato, but the prospect of help with Yanagisawa was alluring. Sano hadn’t realized until this moment how isolated and vulnerable he felt, how exhausted from fourteen years of battling Yanagisawa and never gaining any permanent ground. All of a sudden Ienobu didn’t seem so repulsive. Nor did the idea of Ienobu as the next shogun.
“Destroy them, how?” Sano asked.
“I have friends, remember. They’ll supply evidence that Yanagisawa murdered the shogun’s daughter. All you have to do is pretend to find it. They’ll pressure Yanagisawa’s allies to change sides. We’ll try him for murder and convict him. The shogun will have to put him to death or lose face. And once Yanagisawa is gone, Yoshisato will be a lamb among wolves.” His teeth glistened with saliva in his grin.
Sano knew he should be revolted by this scheme. “That’s fighting dirty.” But somehow he wasn’t, and protecting Yoshisato suddenly seemed less important than a chance at a permanent victory over Yanagisawa.
Ienobu’s hunched shoulders rose in a shrug. “No dirtier than Yanagisawa fights. If you want to win this war, you have to be willing to roll in the mud. Are you?”
* * *
“WHAT DID YOU say to Ienobu?” Reiko asked Sano at dinner that night, after he’d told her and Masahiro about the proposition.
“The same thing I said to Yoshisato. That I would think it over.”
Reiko was so surprised she almost dropped her rice bowl. “You’re not serious?”
“I am.” Sano’s face was drawn with fatigue and unhappiness. “You’ll have noticed that I’m not exactly in a position to turn away potential allies. By the way, I had a confrontation with Yanagisawa and Yoshisato. They may not see eye to eye on how to run the government, but it’s in their mutual interest to destroy me before I can prove that one or both of them murdered the shogun’s daughter.”
“But Ienobu is essentially offering to help you frame Yanagisawa.”
“If Yanagisawa is guilty, which I believe he is, what does it matter how I go about delivering him to justice?” Sano said with a bitter twist of his mouth. “Genuine evidence hasn’t been as plentiful as ruined houses after the earthquake. Fake evidence may have to suffice.”
Reiko was frightened by his cynicism, which was so unlike him. Had his constant struggle to survive in the cutthroat world of politics finally changed the husband she loved into a stranger willing
to compromise his principles?
“Father, how can you say that?” Masahiro asked. “I hate Yanagisawa, too, but it would be dishonorable to frame him.” Reiko saw that he, too, was afraid Sano had changed. “And you’ve always taught me that honor is more important than anything else.”
Sano responded with a wry smile, ashamed of his own blasphemous words yet proud of Masahiro for setting him straight. “Of course it is. I would never want to do what Ienobu suggested. I just had to argue in favor of it and hear how bad it sounded.”
Masahiro sighed with relief, but Reiko’s fear lingered. When put under enough pressure, anyone could be corrupted, even Sano. She hated seeing him pushed toward decisions he wouldn’t ordinarily make.
“It’s odd,” Sano said thoughtfully. “When Ienobu was telling me his proposition, it sounded perfectly reasonable, somehow. It was as if he understood what I wanted, and when he offered to help me get it, I was blind to the reasons why it was bad. I could almost taste the reasons why it was good. Does that make any sense?”
“No,” Reiko said, puzzled. “Of course Ienobu knows you’d like to defeat Yanagisawa. Everybody does. You’ve had other chances to compromise your honor for the sake of political gain and refused them. Why jump at this one?”
“Maybe because I realized that honor probably won’t win my battle against Yanagisawa. I can’t explain it. Ienobu had a strange effect on me.”
“Ienobu has an effect, all right. Being around him feels like touching a slug.” Masahiro made a disgusted face.
Reiko laughed, protesting, “You shouldn’t say that about the shogun’s nephew.”
“I feel like that about him, too,” Sano confessed. “And that’s another reason I didn’t accept Ienobu’s proposition, aside from the fact that it’s dishonorable. Because a samurai shouldn’t make deals with people he instinctively dislikes and distrusts.” He bent a stern, affectionate look on Masahiro. “If I ever forget that, be sure to remind me.”
But Sano hadn’t exactly said he was going to turn down Ienobu’s proposition. Mixed feelings troubled Reiko. On the one hand, she didn’t want Sano entering a dishonorable alliance. On the other, her family needed any port in a storm. “What will Ienobu do if you refuse?”
“He won’t say ‘no hard feelings’ and let me go about my business. He said that if I’m not with him, I’m against him. Meaning, he and his allies will run me out of the regime. Unless Yanagisawa does it first.”
These consequences were as bad as Reiko had thought. “Exactly who are his allies?”
“Several major daimyo clans,” Sano said. “They’re Tokugawa hereditary allies, who are enemies of Yanagisawa. Their combined armies have hundreds of thousands of troops.”
“Who are our allies?” Masahiro asked.
Sano was silent. Reiko and Masahiro already knew the disheartening answer: There was no one powerful whom they could rely on to fight for them. Sano said ruefully, “Remember, Ienobu’s proposition isn’t the only one in front of me. There’s Yoshisato’s.”
“You’re still considering it?” Reiko asked in surprise.
“Being around him isn’t like touching a slug,” Sano said. He and Masahiro smiled at each other.
Reiko frowned. Yoshisato was coming between her and Sano again. “I don’t understand your attachment to Yoshisato.”
“You would if you met him.”
“Does he have an effect on you, too?”
“Not like Ienobu’s. Yoshisato gives the impression of honor and integrity.”
“‘Honor and integrity’? I think he conspired to murder Tsuruhime,” Reiko said, frustrated by Sano’s bias.
“I don’t think he did,” Sano said, frustrated by her lack of understanding. “Yanagisawa could have had Tsuruhime killed without Yoshisato’s knowledge. And I don’t think that either Yanagisawa or Yoshisato knew Tsuruhime was pregnant.”
“I’m afraid I have evidence against Yoshisato.” Reiko was reluctant to fuel her conflict with Sano, but she had to tell him what had happened. “Lady Someko came to see me today.”
Sano almost choked on a mouthful of grilled prawn. Coughing, he said, “I’d thought you had a better chance of getting a visit from the Buddha.”
“So did I.” Reiko summarized her conversation with Lady Someko. “Yoshisato’s own mother suspects him of murder. You shouldn’t keep making excuses for him.”
“You’re right,” Sano said, vexed by her insistence yet chastened. “I shouldn’t accept his proposition, either.”
But he didn’t say he wasn’t going to, Reiko noticed. And she was glad of that, in spite of herself. Yoshisato represented another port in the storm.
“If you turn down Yoshisato and Ienobu, where does that leave us?” Masahiro asked.
“Out in the cold and wide open to attack,” Sano said with brutal frankness.
Reiko crossed her arms over the baby. “What are we going to do?”
“Continue with the investigation. Keep trying to prove Yanagisawa is guilty. Let whatever happens, happen.” Sano added, in a brighter tone, “There’s good news. Ienobu told the shogun about the investigation. The shogun made it official. I won’t have to sneak around or fit it in between my duties as Chief Rebuilding Magistrate.”
“Thank the gods for that, at least,” Reiko said. “What’s the next step?”
“Tomorrow I’ll pay another visit to Lord Tsunanori. I’ll take troops from the army. He can’t refuse to talk or let me interrogate his people this time.” Sano’s mood darkened. “I’ll find out whether he knew his wife was pregnant by another man. I hope he didn’t and I can clear his name. Because if he killed his wife and Yanagisawa had nothing to do with her murder…”
Despair encroached on Reiko’s own hopes. “Then we’ve lost our chance to defeat Yanagisawa.”
24
IN THE HEIR’S residence, Yoshisato prepared for bed. For most of his life he’d liked daytime best, preferring sunlight to darkness, but since he’d come to court, late night was his favorite time. Nobody made demands on him. He didn’t have to play up to the shogun or worry about people thinking he was a fraud. Best of all, he didn’t have to deal with Yanagisawa.
Now it was near midnight. Fresh from a hot bath, dressed in a cotton robe, Yoshisato sat on the floor of his chamber and did stretching exercises. When his muscles released their tension, he could sleep before facing another day as the future dictator of Japan. Yoshisato pretended he was back in his old home, with nothing more difficult to look forward to in the morning than martial arts lessons. He yearned for the peace he would probably never have again.
A light tapping rattled the door. It slid open. Yoshisato frowned at Lady Someko, who stood at the threshold. “Mother. What are you doing here?”
Lady Someko glided into the room. Her face wore the expression that it usually did when she looked at him—fond, worried. “I wanted to see if you were all right.”
“I’m fine,” Yoshisato said curtly as he stretched his arms over his head and leaned sideways. “I’m just about to go to bed.”
Instead of taking the hint, she knelt near him. “It’s been a long time since we had a chance to talk, just the two of us.”
Yoshisato loved her dearly, but he hated having his only private time interrupted. “What do you want?”
She gathered the folds of her brown cloak around her red-orange kimono. She looked anxious and unhappy. Yoshisato recalled the day when he’d been eight years old and he’d begged her to ask his father to come to his first sword-fighting tournament. She’d had to tell him that Yanagisawa wouldn’t come. Her manner was the same now.
“I want you to stop pretending to be the shogun’s son,” she said.
Yoshisato was astonished, and not just because she was asking the impossible. “I thought you thought it was a good idea.”
“I did when Yanagisawa proposed it. He said it was the only way to save your life.”
Five months ago, Ienobu had devised a scheme to have Yoshisato put to death.
Yanagisawa had countered by passing Yoshisato off as the shogun’s son. Yoshisato said, “It worked, didn’t it?”
Lady Someko shook her head. The ornaments in her hair jangled. “He convinced me that it would give you a chance to become as important as you deserve to be.” Her eyes shone with her hope and love for Yoshisato. “You would rule Japan someday! Of course I went along with him.”
“Of course. You always do.” Yoshisato tasted bitter rancor. “You hate him, but you make love to him. How can you let him touch you?”
They’d never discussed her relationship with Yanagisawa. Shame clouded Lady Someko’s face as she realized that Yoshisato had heard her with Yanagisawa, during the time they’d all lived together in the palace guesthouse. Yoshisato had been glad to escape the sound of their passionate, violent sex.
“That’s none of your business,” she snapped, pulling the cloak tighter around herself. “Don’t change the subject.”
“All right.” Yoshisato didn’t really want to talk about her and his father. He hated the fact that she and Yanagisawa had come together again, after seventeen years, because of him. He told himself that if she let Yanagisawa degrade her, it was her own fault. But he couldn’t help thinking that if he’d never been born, she wouldn’t be a slave to Yanagisawa. “Why have you changed your mind about me pretending to be the shogun’s son?”
“Because it’s dangerous.”
“You knew that at the start. Yanagisawa warned us that there were people who wouldn’t believe the shogun was my father.”
“I didn’t know anybody was going to die!”
“Do you mean Tsuruhime? She died of smallpox. She would have, even if Yanagisawa had never thought up his idea, even if I’d never come to court.”
Lady Someko regarded him with disbelief. After a moment’s pause she said, “You never told me you went to visit Tsuruhime.”
A trickle of fear chilled Yoshisato’s heart. Sano wasn’t the only person who suspected him of murdering the shogun’s daughter. His own mother apparently did, too. “Why should I have? I don’t tell you everything.”
The Shogun's Daughter: A Novel of Feudal Japan (Sano Ichiro Mysteries) Page 19